Marita Hewitt

Marita Hewitt's recent series, Of Itself, was presented at Sydney Contemporary 2017. In this series Marita collects and sorts her mail and household paper waste before photographing it. She then transforms the waste into beautiful handmade paper upon which she paints immaculate watercolour images; rendering the crumbled edges of paper, the smudged lines of handwriting, or the printed patterning of tissue wrapping in exquisite detail. The work is then, quite literally, 'of itself'. Hewitt's practice explores the syntax of waste and materiality, and offers intriguing and often poignant insights into the artists own life. One work documents the household paper waste that accumulated following the birth of her daughter. Another depicts the detritus that gathered over a particular period, which marks the time from when ill her mother first began to display symptoms and her death eleven weeks later.